


A New Birth

by onstraysod



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, M/M, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-20
Updated: 2018-12-20
Packaged: 2019-09-23 17:28:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17084585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onstraysod/pseuds/onstraysod
Summary: In a small cottage in Scotland, eight men find reason for a renewal of hope during the holiday season.Written for Day 8 (A Time of Miracles) of the12 Days of Carnivale





	A New Birth

**Author's Note:**

> This AU is set in the same verse as _[Waking the Dead](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15958043)_

“A bit cold for stargazing, isn’t it?”

James smiled as Francis came to stand beside him, his breath a white fog on the black expanse of night.

“I no longer feel the cold, Francis. I’ve endured it so long now it can no longer touch me. It’s like repeating a word over and over until it loses all meaning. You can only feel the cold so long before it ceases to shock you.”

“It stays in the bones,” Francis conceded. “But surely you’re beginning to thaw now, aren’t you James?”

“Slowly.” He met the older man’s gaze and nodded. “Yes, I believe I’m starting to, slowly.” James looked back up at the stars, scattered across the dome of the firmament above them, unusually bright in the clarity of the cold air. “But perhaps it’s right to keep a little of the marrow frozen, if only to remember.”

“I don’t think there is any danger of forgetting.” Francis put one hand on James’s back, stroking softly over the wool of his coat in the span between shoulder blades. The touch was a guidepost, a reminder of the present moment to keep James from losing his way amid the hummocks of memory. They all wandered aimlessly there, from time to time. “Come, let’s go back inside. It’s the season for warmth and brightness. Stargazing can wait for the spring.”

James didn’t argue. He turned and followed Francis, letting the sound of the surf recede into the distance.

The interior of the cottage was so marked a contrast from the atmosphere of his silent vigil outside that it took James a moment, after stepping over the threshold, to acclimate his senses. Light and color, heat and sound, mouthwatering aromas and bustling activity in every corner of the central room momentarily overwhelmed him, before bringing a smile to his lips. The flames of a dozen candles danced merrily in every recess, and Peglar was lighting the oil lamps on the table. This was spread with a fresh white cloth and adorned with pine boughs, their sharp, clean scent perfuming the air. A brisk fire, to which Blanky was adding more logs, blazed in the hearth, the heat of it carried to the rafters. And in the corner, Little and Jopson were edging around the spreading branches of a fir tree, fixing various shiny baubles and red ribbons to its still-living limbs. James arched an eyebrow at Francis.

“I’m still not sure about the tree,” he confessed. “Whose idea was that, anyway?”

“The Prince Regent, apparently.” Blanky spoke around the stem of his pipe as he used a poker to edge one of the logs deeper into the fire. “Some kind of German tradition. During our absence it’s become all the fashion, according to the papers.”

“God forbid we fall behind the fashion,” James conceded to Francis’s amusement.

“I keep expecting to happen upon a squirrel,” Little commented. He handed a length of ribbon to Jopson, who stood upon a stepladder to reach the upper branches. James watched the look that passed between them, the way their fingers met and lingered in the touch.

“That would be wonderful!” Goodsir emerged from the other side of the tree, a scattering of green needles in his dark curls. “I’ve always wanted to make a pet of a red squirrel, but they’re awfully difficult to catch.”

“No, absolutely not.” James shook his head vehemently and this seemed to amuse Francis all the more, for he threw back his head and guffawed heartily. “We’ve already taken in two stray dogs and Bridgens has practically made a pet of that tabby that hangs about the kitchen garden. But I must positively draw the line at squirrels.”

As if in response to this mention, the two dogs in question - a deerhound and a scruffy little Scottish terrier - bounded into the room, having been chased out of the kitchen where they’d been lingering in hope of scraps. They leapt at James, accepting his affectionate scratches before darting off to claim the warmest spots on the hearthrug.

“You forgot about Tom Bowline,” Peglar said, grinning. He was setting the table now, laying out plates and cutlery, all of which had been polished to a high shine. James groaned.

“The less said about that menace, the better.”

Blanky’s smile was positively wicked. “And here I’d given him your nom de plume, James, as a gesture of honor.”

The subject of conversation - an African gray parrot Blanky had won in an afternoon poker game from a Portuguese sailor down at the harbor - had been removed from the room for the evening’s festivities and was currently enjoying a nap in Blanky’s back bedroom.

“A gesture of honor, you say? Perhaps I would be flattered, were that creature’s vocabulary a little less foul. That bird knows more filthy limericks than most common seamen.”

“Yes, but fortunately most of them are recited in Portuguese and no one here understands that language,” Jopson said, the corner of his lips twitching.

A pause. Then, in unison, everyone but Fitzjames cried: “Except James.”

James rolled his eyes. It was a running joke, and he accepted it with his customary good humor, disguised as irritation. All the men knew of James’s origins now: their secrets had been shed on that far distant island, as heavy and useless as spare anchors and ships’ boats filled with old clothes. They accepted James as the half-Portuguese bastard he was, just as they accepted Blanky’s Hebrew heritage, Francis’s alcoholism, the old, abiding love between Bridgens and Peglar, and the fresh passion between Jopson and Little. What a waste of time it had been, James thought, what a waste of effort too, the years all of them had spent fighting to disguise their true selves. And how wonderful that it was these true selves - unvarnished, whittled down, real - that they’d come to love and respect with a devotion the polished mannequins they’d tried to create could never have earned.

“It is beautiful, though, I must admit,” James said, nodding at the tree. Now Goodsir, Jopson, and Little were tying small tapers to the branches, lighting them from a candle and adding a new blaze of luminosity to the room.

“Aye, it is that,” Blanky agreed, puffing out a ring of smoke.

“We don’t wish to make you feel excluded, Thomas,” James said, although this was hardly the first time he had broached the subject. “You are welcome, you know, to celebrate this season in your own way.”

“Oh, I know that. But I’ve never been fussed about such things,” Blanky assured him. “Besides, I always took part in the Christmas traditions Esther and the girls put on.” The ice master smiled fondly, his gaze directed at some internal scene before seeming to shake himself back to the present moment. “What I do get fussed about, however, is a good roast goose.” He sniffed at the air. “Would you take a whiff of that.”

“John’s fixed a right feast,” Peglar told them. “Goose, ham, potatoes, his mother’s plum pudding. There’s mulled cider and roast nuts and every good thing you can imagine. I’d better go give him a hand bringing it all out.”

“I’ll lend a hand myself.” Blanky pivoted neatly on his wooden foot, winking at James and Francis as he passed. “Might use these nimble fingers of mine to sneak a morsel while I’m at it.”

James waited until Blanky was out of earshot. “We must find some way to bring them here, Francis,” he whispered. “Asking a man to remain dead to his parents and siblings, his friends, is hard enough a thing to demand. But asking a man to be a stranger from his wife and children?” He shook his head. “We can’t do that. If anyone would willingly keep our secret, surely it would be Esther and the girls.”

Francis nodded. “We’ll find a way.” He paused thoughtfully, considering James’s profile. “And what of the other person I proposed bringing into our secret? Have you given the idea more thought?”

“Ross. Yes, I think you’re right. We’ll put it to the men after Christmas, but I see the merits of your plan.”

“James Ross has no real love for the Admiralty, especially now. His loyalty to us is greater. Yet he is ideally placed, and has the influence, to make our way smoother for us in future. Under the auspices of getting our back pay to family members, he can funnel the money to us. And we can begin that business venture I spoke of,” Francis added, warming to his subject as he leaned close to James.

“Shipbuilding.” James smiled, his dark eyes gleaming in the multitude of candlelight. “It is inspired, Francis.”

“What do we know better? Our location here is ideal for it. And there would be a role for all of us in it: Thomas, Edward, Peglar of course, but also Tom and John: they’re perfect administrators. And Harry has a place, too, with his knowledge of the latest scientific advances. The eight of us can form a company that will build the most modern, most technologically advanced ships in all of Britain, if not all of Europe. I believe it, James.”

James was watching his fellow captain talk with obvious delight. “Your enthusiasm is infectious, Francis. Listening to you I do not conceive of any way we could fail. Yet our company would appear as if out of nowhere. Would it raise suspicions, do you think?”

Francis shook his head. “New ventures are started everyday. By former merchant seamen, whalers, tradesmen. As an investor, James Ross would get all of the attention. We would remain as anonymous as any other men of business.” He stared intently at James. “It could be a good life, James. Not the life we’d planned on, but a good and useful one.”

“Better than what we’d planned.” James nodded toward the tree where Jopson, Little, and Goodsir were laughing together about something. Their smiles were bright and whole, their eyes shone with health and humor, their cheeks were rosy from the heat of the hearth. They were far different men from those that had stumbled across the shale of King William Island, gums seeping blood, joints aching, bones protruding from their flesh. And yet they were the same, and would always be so: men completely altered by a shared experience of suffering. And brought together by it. “Look at Tom and Edward, Francis. The lives they’d planned for after the expedition didn’t include one another. Would they trade what they have now for those imagined lives if they could? Somehow I doubt it. Not when I see the way they look at one another. We don’t always know what we need in life, what will make us the happiest.” He turned to Francis, raising his hand and laying it at the nape of the other man’s neck. His fingers kneaded gently into warm skin. “I certainly didn’t.”

Francis put his arm around James and pulled him close. “Neither did I.”

“Supper is ready,” John Bridgens announced, entering the room. In his hands he held a silver platter, laden with a massive goose, cooked to a glistening golden-brown. Peglar followed with the pudding, while Blanky brought up the rear of the procession, grinning from ear to ear and nibbling on a sugared plum from one of the platters he bore. Little, Jopson, and Goodsir hovered excitedly over the food for a moment before following Peglar back to the kitchen to retrieve more dishes. The dogs, meanwhile, were back on their feet, circling the table with eager, swishing tails.

“Phoenix,” James murmured.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Let’s name our shipbuilding venture after the phoenix. Or some such mythical beast. Something that rose from the ashes and was born anew.” He beamed at Francis. “Isn’t that what we’ve done? We’ve survived, Francis. And now we’re beginning again. Not forgetting what’s come before, just… starting on a new adventure.”

Francis nodded. He threaded his fingers through James’s. “Together from the very beginning, this time.”


End file.
